"It was almost like the system was taunting me,"
"No matter how you excel, the system always comes back to haunt you, to remind you that you did all of that, and yet you really don't have a choice."
"It is keeping people chained and, in a sense, locking up their potential and their dreams."
Alex immigrated to the U.S. as a toddler and has long felt haunted by undocumented status. He became eligible for DACA at 15 but lost the opportunity when the program was rescinded in 2017. In 2020 he declined a full scholarship to Harvard over travel and status concerns and instead enrolled at a nearby University of California campus. DACA originally provided work authorization and deportation protection in 2012, but legal battles have largely frozen new applications since 2017, leaving hundreds of thousands of students without relief. Increased enforcement has further threatened DACA recipients and international students, constraining educational attainment and prospects for undocumented youth.
Read at Los Angeles Times
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